By: centraljersey.com
The community is hereby invited to attend a forum. The purpose of this gathering is to create and orchestrate for the future of our community. If it is to become a better place for ourselves and our posterity, it is we who must make it so.
We live in a place called Allentown/Upper Freehold. It is unclear if this is one place, two places or many places. There are many people and many homes and businesses but it is called "a" community. Is the extent of our community defined by its physical bounds or by some other more personal measurement?
What defines Allentown/Upper Freehold really? Historically, Allentown was/is a small village that sprang up around a grist mill that was built in 1706 (that’s before George Washington was born!). Its purpose was to grind the wheat grown on the surrounding farms into flour. This was an activity that drew others to the place, people to fix the wagons, people to teach the kids, people, people, people, people to build the houses and so on. It all had purpose. What purpose do we have now? Are you satisfied with our place being characterized as a "bedroom community," a place where people come to sleep and go off somewhere else to work? Yes, we have changed with the changes but remember, the changes keep coming. So the question before you is simply this: What should we do? This will be a roundtable discussion, where your vision of the future of our community can be shared, molded, morphed and folded into the ideas and visions of your neighbor. Who knows, we just might come up with something; it’s worth a try. If you accept this invitation, please respond with an e-mail to [email protected] at which time you will be given more information.
Corky Danch Allentown
Working hard for Plumsted
To the editor:
My name is Jack Trotta and I am writing this letter to ask for your vote on Nov. 2 for the two-year unexpired term on the Plumsted Township Committee.
Last week The Messenger-Press ran an article about the local election. The article stated that I did not return phone calls. I have since spoken to the reporter, Joanne Degnan, and I have given her my cell phone to call instead of my home phone. I am one of the lucky Americans that still have a job and was at work when she called. By the time I had received the messages from Ms. Degnan it was past the time that the newspaper was going to print.
A few of the reasons my wife, Kathy, and I chose to move to Plumsted in 2003 are the low taxes, rural nature of the town and, of course, the good reputation the school system had.
After looking for a home in Ocean, Monmouth, Burlington and Mercer counties, Kathy and I found that Plumsted had one of the lowest property taxes in the state and felt that Plumsted’s record of preserving land from developers would help keep it that way. As your township committeeman, I pledge to continue this tradition of land preservation that has brought so many of us to this town.
The school system in Plumsted is much smaller than the town we left. The school district we moved from had more students learning all day in a classroom trailer than New Egypt has in its entire high school. We felt that this smaller school system would provide more one-on-one learning opportunities for our children: Mike, now a high school senior, and Andy, a sophomore. Our children have done so much better here in this district than they could have in the previous one and want to thank the school district staff for their work.
From my very first meeting as your township committeeman, I have been working hard to save your tax dollars and to keep you safe. For example, I voted to approve the shared-services agreements between the school district and the town to provide for the presence of a police officer at our schools and the busing for all of our schoolchildren, thus making their travels to and from school safe, and eliminating what would have been a much more expensive alternative of hiring many crossing guards if the busing had been eliminated.
On Tuesday, Nov. 2, please vote for my running mates, Dave Leutwyler and Steve Reed, and me, Jack Trotta, for Plumsted Township Committee in Column "A." We have been working hard to keep Plumsted safe, rural and affordable and will continue to do so.
Jack A. Trotta Plumsted
Plumsted mayor endorses Trotta, Leutwyler, Reed
To the editor:
Plumsted Township Committeemen Jack Trotta, Dave Leutwyler and Steve Reed are supporters of the 2010 no-tax-increase municipal budget, a budget that reduced spending by $663,000 from the previous year due to the recessionary economy declining revenues and less state aid. With record-setting unemployment and home foreclosure rates, taxpayers need fiscal conservatives like Mr. Trotta, Mr. Leutwyler and Mr. Reed.
Plumsted’s Farm and Woodland Preservation Program, with more than 40 farms and 3,000 acres protected from future development, is under the leadership of Mr. Trotta, who is committed to keeping Plumsted rural and affordable.
Maintaining Plumsted’s ranking as one of the safest communities with one of the lowest crime rates is a public safety priority, as well as having a Police Department that is now due to receive national recognition from the Commission on Accreditation for Law Enforcement Agencies (CALEA). With the support of Committeemen Trotta, Leutwyler and Reed, Plumsted’s Police Department has successfully advanced to comply with the 112 standards that represent the best practices in law enforcement. Earlier this month, Plumsted’s Police Department had a two day on-site inspection and assessment as part of the accreditation process through the N.J. Law Enforcement Commission, which is administered by the N.J. State Association of Chiefs of Police, and is being recommended to become just the 40th police department in the state and the second in Ocean County to be state-accredited and nationally recognized by CALEA.
Thank you for your consideration of supporting the election of Committeemen Trotta, Leutwyler and Reed to Plumsted’s Township Committee.
Ronald S. Dancer Mayor Plumsted Township
Jack Trotta, a Republican who was appointed to the Township Committee in July, is running against Democrat Anthony O’Donnell for a two-year unexpired term. Republican incumbents David Leutwyler and Steven Reed are unopposed for three-year terms.

